Kids Olympics

This morning, I did something that Meritt our local Coffee House Mom would never do - it took me over an hour to make my coffee. During this time, I made kids breakfast, snacked on something myself, worked on cleaning the hotspots in my kitchen, scanned some blogs . . . all the while telling my kids to wait while I make my coffee. It was once I got to Meritt's blog that I realized she would never put cleaning before coffee.

So, stopped immediately and made my coffee before I worked on cleaning some more.

I'm taking a minute to tell you about yesterday's Olympics before I get ready to leave for the day.

I had a lot of fun playing with the kindergarten class yesterday. I brought along another mom. She is from Mexico and only speaks Spanish. My Spanish is 20 years old and was never very good. It's pretty much down to what I've learned from Dora the Explorer.

So, I looked up some basic Spanish phrases on-line so we could communicate during the day. I know I would want someone to try to communicate with me. You could tell she appreciated my efforts. I know her son appreciated my bringing her to class. She is a bit of an introvert.

First we had a torch relay to the gym, then played 3 games - skiing, skeleton, and tumbling. OK, tumbling is part of the summer Olympics, but we knew the kids would enjoy it. Then, afterwards we had a medal ceremony and snack.

The kids loved it, Sarah's teacher enjoyed it. I'm very glad I took the time to teach the kids about something different. I'm grateful that our school system allows different to be taught during the year, and I'm grateful that Sarah's teacher is open to parents teaching things.

I told her teacher that anytime she wants to do team teaching, even if I don't have a kid in her class, to give me a call. She told me that she loves my openness to modify what I'm teaching to the kid's mood that day.

I do this a bit with my college students too. I'm willing to modify to their interests, what is capturing the interest of that section or group of students. My own struggles with learning have helped me know that not everyone has the same learning style. It's one of the things that intimidates me if I end up teaching this class for the business school. I won't have quite the same flexibility with my lesson plans.

I've turned in my teaching statement this week. Now I wait to see if they will offer the job to me. My boss is concerned that I'm getting in over my head. I'm concerned about trying to teach a class that will require me to develop a semester long class section again this summer.

But, until the job is offered, there is no reason to decide if I will take the job.

I hope everyone has a nice weekend. I might need more coffee!